Fall of the Cards by Rosemary Badcoe

Fall of the Cards

The roof tiles stir with sneaking magpies.
Curled in cold and cramps, I wait
high in the attic, above the bailiffs.

Through the eaves wasps crawl, make nests.
They ask if this is home, but I cannot
reply. That evening they chew the walls

to paper. Downstairs, phones ring
until the phones are taken. Dustsheets
shade what’s left of furniture. I shift

the lids of boxes, sort through remains,
turn Tarot cards. I am the High Priestess,
sit with hands laid in my lap, take

no action but to wait, hold cups and coins
in hiding places. You passed your fist
across my face, lost all of this

and me. I think of love played out
against the heather, honey-scented,
stilled in stagnant peat. Moorland-eyed

I scan the roads, watch for the vans,
for thieving birds in black and white.

by Rosemary Badcoe

Editor’s Note: The imagery in this poem is both surreal and sharply detailed, giving the lines a haunting sense of emotion. The narrator feels both sinister and lost.